For the Sky is hollow and the World is round
by Vaelerya
Summary: A story taking place almost a hundred years after Eragon and Saphira left Alagaesia. A new Rider has come to Burthr to be taught by him. The long era of peace seems to come to an end. What will Eragon and Saphira do?


**For the sky is hollow and the World is round.**

This story takes place ninety-nine years after Eragon Shadeslayer and Saphira Bjartskular defeated the evil king Galbatorix in Uru'baen,  
now once again know as Ilirea.

The Riders have risen once again and Eragon and Saphira are living their lives peacefully, in a land far from Alagaesia, called Burthr,  
meaning ''Birth'' in the Ancient Language. This is because, not only have Eragon and Saphira chosen to start the Riders anew on this very soil,  
Saphira also laid her eggs on the very spot their house is now built.

Eragon smiled at the thought.  
He and Saphira lay atop of the highest hill in the area, right next to their house. Her enormous blue body lay curled around Eragon.  
The tip of her spiked tail lay alongside her scaled cheek.  
The sunlight that touched her scales exploded in a thousand blue specks, moving incoherently over the grass whenever Saphira did.  
Eragon sat with his legs crossed over each other, his back against Saphira's warm belly.  
He could feel her ribs going up and down with her every breath.  
_My children have long gone. _Saphira said.  
_Aye, they have but I spoke the words over the silver-blue egg.__  
__It has yet to hatch, but when it does it will join us here in Burthr for many years. I cannot say where the others are,__  
__but we could always look for them with our minds? But I know they are safe and well._

Five eggs she had lain. A silvery blue one, two purple ones, though one was almost six shades lighter than the other, one that was so dark blue it had to be held near a fire or in sunlight for it would appear black otherwise.  
And lastly egg of which Eragon thought it was green, but Saphira was convinced it was blue. It turned into an argument so fierce; Saphira broke over six trees with her tail and even set a part of the forest on fire. Which Blödhgarm had to extinguish before it spread. Eragon eventually scried Angela, looking for her help to settle the manner. She told him that it was neither yet both. It was a mixture of blue and green, the name of the color was teal.  
When he told Saphira she simply nodded her head and refused to talk about it any further.

A sigh of longing came from her, smoke came out of her nostrils and his hair tussled with the warm wind of her breath.  
She sent him a thought of mixed emotions.

He looked over at the landscape. Mountains covered the horizon and the late afternoon sun colored the sky orange and pink, though the sky above him was still blue. Three dragons and their Riders flew far away, who they were he could not tell. But he thought he saw Garrow on his orange dragon, Baldür.  
It was hard to tell on this time of day, even with his sharp elven eyes.

Then suddenly he felt another mind trying to enter his, if this was another time, almost a hundred years ago, Eragon would have been startled and put as much walls around his mind as he could, ready to fight off the intruder.  
But times were different now, and he had nothing to fear long as he was in Burthr. He opened his mind.

_Ebrithil, it is me Adrlein.__  
_Adrlein was a female knurlan of Dûrgrimst Vernshrrgn, the war clan of the dwarven race. She rode a pinkish red female dragon.  
Cayenne; the color was called according to Angela, she told him while they were scrying. Adrlein and Dorzada, as was the dragon's name, meaning love or adoration in Dwarvish, were new to the Riders.  
Dorzada was only eleven months old and still had much to learn.  
Adrlein was quite young also, only thirty-four years old. She had barely reached adulthood by dwarven standards.

_Yes Adrlein, speak your mind.__  
__Ebrithil, Dorzada and I, we were opening our minds to the world, to feel the creatures around us as you instructed.__  
__Good, tell me, what did you feel?__  
_This time, Dorzada spoke, a soft gentle voice, like that of a mother telling her child to close its eyes and dream the most beautiful dreams.  
_It was quite extraordinary, Ebrithil. A part of the Forest flooded and the ants gathered together to float over the surface of the water, protecting their queen.__  
__Then a grasshopper came, it jumped atop the float-ants and started picking them off one by one. But the ants did not budge and those who did not need to float attacked the green-giant-grasshopper-eater and they defeated it._

_Yes, yes_, Saphira interrupted, _but what of the other creatures?__  
__The birds, the spiders, the dragons and fish? The Urgralgra, the knurlan, the two-legs-round-ears and the alfakyn?__  
_With each example she gave, she showed an image of it with her mind.  
_What can you tell me of them, Adrlein and Dorzada?_

_Nothing, Ebrithilar. _They said at the same time.

Eragon frowned and continued; _Then you have failed once again. Remember, you must open your mind to all creatures, see without seeing. Hear them all, understand them all, and feel them all at once. Do that and you pass._

_Yes Ebrithil._ And Eragon shut off the connection with their minds, leaving him and Saphira alone again.  
Saphira rumbled with amusement. _They sound much like us in our younger days.  
When we were still in Ellesméra with Oromis and Glaedr-elda.__  
__Aye that they do._

''Eragon! Eragon! Are you there?''  
Eragon whipped his head up. The sound came from the house behind them.  
He looked at Saphira with a stupid grin on his face.  
_Stop looking like a lost whelp and go inside. _she said in a harsh tone, but her emotions were that those of happiness and excitement. The tip of her gigantic tail whipped around.

''Yes I'm coming!'' he yelled.  
He bounded to the house, graceful as an antelope.  
He slowed his pace down to a walk when he was at the front door, and walked into his home. The house and all other buildings on Burthr were built by him,  
the Eldunarí and the elves that joined him on his journey to find a land suitable for dragons.

It was made the same way as the buildings on Vroengard.  
First off, the buildings were enormous, great halls of such proportions that 300 men could have easily fit inside.  
Every door was like the mouth to a great, unexplored cavern.  
Every window as tall and as wide as a castle gate. Every wall was a sheer cliff.  
Thick mats of ivy strangled the blocks of stone, and where there was no ivy there was moss, which meant that his home,  
and all the other buildings for that matter, blended into the landscape and looked as if they had sprouted from the earth itself.  
What little of the stone was bare tended to be a pale ocher, although patches of red, brown and dusky blue were also visible.

He walked inside the house, through the giant hall, up the stairs that led to his normal sized bedroom. Upon entering the room, he looked at the mirror above his writing desk. There he saw the most beautiful woman in existence.  
''May good fortune rule over you.'' Eragon said.  
''May peace live in your heart.'' She replied with her musical voice.  
''And may the stars watch over you.'' A short silence fell thereafter.  
"Arya,'' he sighed. ''Eragon,'' she replied with a soft smile,  
''time has not changed you one bit.'' ''Neither has it you, Arya Dröttning.''

Arya was Queen of the elves and a Rider also.  
She has been a great help to Eragon in his quest to smite Galbatorix,  
and he had fallen in love with her the moment he laid his eyes upon her.  
Even though she was bruised and broken at that time.  
She had emerald green eyes with golden specks in them, like sunlight shining through oak leaves.  
Her eyes were slanted upwards, giving her a feline and exotic look. Her skin was perfectly smooth and had a light bronze undertone, as if she had been sleeping in the sun for a full day. Small, brown freckles covered the bridge of her nose and highly set cheekbones. Her lips were full and had a soft pink shade. And her hair was black as night, lying in a single braid over her shoulder and ending right were her ribs would end.  
Her ears were narrow and pointed, like those of a cat, but even longer.  
She wore a dark green tunic, standard elven attire.  
And a circlet that resembled graceful vines adorned her head. It held a single diamond.

''Going somewhere?'' Eragon asked.  
''How do you know, Shadeslayer?'' She replied almost teasingly._  
_He pointed at her through the mirror. ''You're wearing a leather tunic, that is no outfit for a Queen, not unless she's going somewhere of course.''  
She sighed, smiling. ''Ah, you got me. I was going to surprise you with it but I suppose you've gotten sharper over the years. I'm coming to Burthr, Eragon.  
Another egg has hatched, for a very… interesting girl this time.  
I will accompany her and her dragon to Burthr as I have the Rider before her and the others as well.''

He smiled. Arya had promised Eragon to accompany every new Rider and dragon to Burthr. First, they would stay in Ellesméra for six months, or until the dragon had learned to breathe fire. In that time, the Rider and dragon had to learn the basics of the Ancient Language if they could not already, for that was the only language to be spoken on Burthr, amongst Riders and dragons at least. After that, they would join Arya and Fírnen, her green dragon, to Burthr.  
That way, they could see each other from time to time.  
Although it was actually Fírnen who insisted upon it,  
so he could spend time with his mate, Eragons partner of heart and mind, Saphira.

''And what makes this girl so interesting, if I may ask?''  
She smiled. ''That I will not say, but I think you'll be very happy to see her.''  
Her words made Eragon even more curious about the girl and her dragon but he decided to leave it for now, he know Arya well enough, better than anyone actually, to know she would refuse to tell anymore then she already had.  
''Fine then. When will you arrive?''  
''Before the full moon, I think. It will depend on the other two.  
The dragon, Skalvaskr is his name I believe, is still very young, we will probably have to rest often.''  
Eragon looked up at the sky; the moon was already visible, though she looked almost translucent. It was still young, for the full moon had passed not too long ago. He sighed; it meant that it would still be a while before he could see her again. Smell her again. Hold her again.  
He missed her so much at times his heart felt like it was being gripped by claws of iron.  
_Take hold of your feelings little one, I too must wait for Fírnen.__  
__I know. _He focused his attention back on Arya.  
''That would mean it shall take about three weeks time?'' It wasn't a question.  
She smiled her perfect smile at him again. ''I'll see you then, Eragon.''  
And their eyes locked for just a moment. Then, never breaking the gaze, she whispered a few words, the mirror rippled and he was staring at his own reflection.

His brown hair and eyes. His pointy nose and strong jaw line.  
His fairly narrow lips and the dimple in his chin.  
His shoulders were broad and the muscles in his neck rippled as he swallowed, his Adams apple bobbed up and down. His face was narrow and angular, like that of an elf but it still contained a hardness that no elf possesses, for he was born a human.  
His ears were longer than any normal human ears AND ended in a point. His body was slim but muscular.  
He wore a light brown leather tunic with hints of green and orange,  
it was given to him many years ago when the first dragon hatched for a new elven rider, Nadaela.  
It was a gift to him from Arya. Thanks to magic it still looked as if it was new, and showed no sign of damage whatsoever.  
The pants he wore were of a darker brown, and around his waist hung a dark blue belt with twelve diamonds concealed within it.  
After the battle of Uru'baen he was unable to retrieve a similar belt, known as the Belt of Beloth the Wise. So he decided to make a new one.  
He made it himself and named it the Belt of Uncovering Truth.  
For not only did the belt contain twelve diamonds which are used for storing energy, it also had runes of the Ancient Language carved within it.  
It said ''_Fortha Ilumëo''_ Put forth Truth. Meaning that, in whichever language the person was speaking, as long as they spoke to him, they could only speak the truth. It would not count for their thoughts, only the words they spoke.  
But it was still something that would come in handy from time to time.

Eragon wondered about the new dragon and Rider. The Rider was a girl,  
that much Arya had made clear. And the dragon was a male named Skalvaskr.  
_A fine name. _Saphira mentioned. _Aye, a fine name indeed._

Eragon looked up at the sky through his bedroom window.  
The sun was now nearly in contact with the horizon and the stars could already be seen. He opened his mind and searched for his companions.  
When he found his eight pupils he said: _Night will soon fall, meet with me on the field next to Lake Aren and join me for dinner.__  
_Then he closed his mind again. _Let us go Saphira._ With that, the ground shook as she stood up, and presumably stretched judging by the sounds he heard. He felt and heard her footsteps as she walked over to his window.

It was only a nine and a half feet jump from his balcony to the gap between Saphira's neck and shoulders. And from this height he could look her directly in the eye without her having to look down too much. As soon as she stood in front of him he left the window and walked over to his balcony.  
First peeked over the edge to see if it was safe enough, when he confirmed it was, he climbed on the edge and gracefully leaped down.  
For a second he felt weightless and heavy at the same time before landing on Saphira's unstable flesh. He slipped, stuck his arms out and flailed them to try and stay upright; his hands came in contact with one her giant spikes, as high as his hips. He grabbed the spike and regained his balance.

She made a sound like crashing boulders which was her version of laughing.  
_Maybe you should magic next time. _She said mockingly. _Maybe._


End file.
